PC Market to Witness a Growth of 30 Percent This Year

The past two decades have for the first time seen a reported shrink of personal computer (PC) sales in global market while in China it is still booming with a growth rate to top 30 percent this year, according to a report in Friday's Beijing Morning Post.

The sluggish global PC market would not affect much the Chinese market since there exist fundamental differences between the Chinese PC market and European and US markets, said Chen Chong, an official with the Ministry of Information Industry on Thursday.

China's market would keep the growth momentum for 5 to 10 years, predicted Yang Yuanqing, president of Legend Group, a PC giant in Asia Pacific region. The growth rate for PC in China this year would be around 30 percent and there would be no big problem to realize an annual increase of 25 to 30 percent in next five years.

Far from being popular in China the PC's popularity rate is still less than 30 percent even in such big cities as Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou. It is believed that they have the strongest purchasing power across the country but the popularity is no more than 10 percent so far as the whole country is concerned.

About 10 million medium-sized and small businesses in China are still using computers individually and only 2 percent of the country's large and medium-sized enterprises have established their Intranets. Big gap exits between the actual and the potential PC markets while the impending entry of WTO and the hosting of 2008 Olympics would effect a strong boost to China's PC market.

The lucrative PC market in China has attracted famous PC manufactures worldwide. A low-price strategy in China adopted by Dell has increased its sales in Asia by 40 percent. Some other famous brands, such as IBM and Compaq, are also targeting at China's market and a fierce competition between domestic PC producers and foreign counterparts is predicted within half a year.



By PD Online Staff Li Heng


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